Long Time, No See

IIII: II

Denver

She sits tensely across from me, somehow physically radiating waves of hostility from every orifice and pore from her lithe body. I begin to open my mouth and begin when a cacophony of car horns sound from below her large window on the other side of the living room. Her head whips towards the origin of the sound with her turning her body slightly to look behind her and I watch her unable to draw my eyes away from the length of her slim, smooth neck.

God, when did I become such a creep??

I drag my eyes away from her just in time before she turns to face me again, I try to distract her from the rush of red spreading across my face by coughing awkwardly as if clearing my throat whilst taking my suit jacket off to take some of the weight off my body constricting me.

Here goes nothing.

"Well," I begin slowly "there's no easy way to say this so I'll just go on ahead and tell you." I take a shaky breath in which I'm sure she notices as her icy demeanor becomes a bit concerned.

"The last evening we ever saw each other, was the same evening that...My parents were murdered." My eyes fall from her face but I still hear the gasp that escapes through her teeth.

"What?" She whispers into her hands, that flew up to her mouth after my revelation.

"When I arrived home that day, the police were already at my house and my grandmother had already been told the news." Another shaky sigh leaves my mouth as my throat constricts and my eyes begin to sting thinking back to that horrible day. Across from me, Denise sits absolutely still as if frozen in time, unblinking.

"E-Everything is... still a blur when I try to think about it. I'm told that at one point I fainted but I can't remember that happening. I only remember waking up later to my Godparents telling me that I'm moving to another state to live with them. There- There was simply no time to talk to you or even see you before we left. I was so distraught and... confused... I think I was just numb to everything and everyone around me and I guess that included you." I finish the story without looking up, my right hand clenching slowly in an effort to distract myself from the pain sitting on my chest.

"H-How did they die?" 

Her shakily whispered question makes my head whip up quickly, having forgotten she was there temporarily whilst getting lost in my thoughts. She looks so broken at that moment, I don't even think she's realized that she's sitting significantly closer to me than when we first started talking. Tears streamed silently down her face though she makes an effort to wipe them away when she sees I've noticed them.

She never liked crying in front of me when we were small too. Some things never change huh?

A sad smile adorns my face as I retell her what the police told my grandmother before I arrived.

"They were eating at some upscale restaurant in town, mum always said she needed a night out every month and my dad could never say no to her. Apparently the place was held up by these men who wanted to rob the restaurant as well as the people dining." A bitter laugh leaves my lips and my hands clench harder the way they do every time I think of those scumbags.

"My parents were one of the ones targetted because of their publicly known friendship with Mike Hendricks, my Godfather, who owns a well known but small company in town, my father had a small number of shares in the company though he was in software development. When the men came round to take from my parents my father resisted their demands and tried to wrestle the man to the ground, one of them shot him in the stomach. M-My mother meanwhile had secretly called the police but rushed over to try and aid him -- they shot her too something about wanting to shut her up from what eyewitnesses say. Sh-She died instantly. My father... died alone in the back of the ambulance truck on his way to the hospital. The men were apprehended and they were the only casualties of the night because of their actions."